Words and photos by Michael Chandler

Nothing lasts forever. Memories fade, seasons change, and projects run their course. Such is the case with La Flama Blanca, Dallion Felton’s Evo X street car/RallySport Direct’s project car. After two years and 80,000 miles, it was time to say goodbye. So I made Dallin, and his little doge Hiroshi, drive to an office park so I could say goodbye to the car. And also to play with his dog, but mostly to say goodbye to the car.

The car looks mostly the same, sans all the vinyl decals.

It still has the APR splitter, vortex generators and GTC 300 wing. It sits on the same red 18×10.5 Volk TE37RTs, and it still has the Ohlins coilovers. To be honest, this thing is pretty much the exact same as it was back in February. That’s not a bad thing at all. Back then it put down a healthy 293 horsepower and 289 lb/ft of torque, which is pretty good considering what power adders were installed.

Fairly simple straight forward things: Tomei Titanium cat-back, test pipe, Big Mouth downpipe, and upper intercooler pipe. A Mishimoto intercooler, oil cooler, and radiator are things you would find on a lot of street driven Evo Xs, as are the AEM intake and TurboSmart blow off valve. The biggest changes are ones you can’t see.

Those big changes? A set of 1300cc fuel injectors from Injector Dynamics, a Cosworth high volume fuel rail, a TurboSmart fuel pressure regulator, and an AEM E85 capable 320lph fuel pump cradled in a Cobb Tuning fuel pump holder. Oh, and a Cavalli Stage 2 Turbo. The ball bearing, single scroll turbo has a 58mm inducer and 56mm exducer, and fits like the OEM turbo. Despite fitting like the stock turbo, it makes more power than the stock turbo. How much more? With a fresh tune on 91 octane the car put down 330 horsepower and 277 lb/ft of torque. On a tune optimized for E70 (ethanol, corn fuel, stuff you can’t get at a pump in Salt Lake County as far as I know) it made 408 horsepower and 345 lb/ft of torque!

Those are respectable numbers for a street car! And there’s more room for the next owner to turn up the heat. The turbo can move enough air for 600 horsepower. And yes, I said next owner. By now the car, and many of its parts have found new homes with other Evo Xs. Fear not, Dallin is on to bigger and better things.

If you’re familiar with RallySport Direct, then you’ve undoubtedly seen this car. If you think that this is the company’s car and I had to twist a bunch of arms to be able to take pictures of it, then you’d be wrong. All I had to do was ask Dallin Felton, because he’s the guy who drives it and has been molding it into what you see here.

Dallin is a regular guy, just like any of us. The biggest difference is that he happens to work for RallySport Direct, whereas we do not. That, and he has a history of building some awesome cars. He had a Daytona Violet M3 and a Voltex Evo VIII, so having him take the reigns of the Evo X project wasn’t that huge of a stretch or risk.

White is the color of choice for the Evo, as it is for the rest of the RSD fleet; however, this one is accented not with blue, gray and pink like the rest of the cars. It’s strictly white and red, aside from the windshield banner of course. For everyday use the car rolls on a set of 18×10.5 Volk Racing TE37RTs, covered by a set of Bridgestone Potenza RE760’s. The Potenza’s measure in at a healthy 275/35. Behind the red Volks you see the factory red Brembo brake calipers and the Stoptech slotted rotors they clamp down on. The slotted rotors are part of Stoptech’s Sport Kit which comprises of the slotted rotors (front and rear), stainless steel brake lines and their Street Performance brake pads.

The car has an aggressive stance, but not crazy like a Bond villain. The Ohlins Road and Track coilovers allow for the height adjustment, while a lengthy list of Whiteline components (ball socket end links, 27mm sway bars, control arm bushings and rear control arms, and roll kit) round out the rest of the suspension set up. Why the high dollar coilovers and half the Whiteline catalog? Because La Flama Blanca goes and gets it on the autocross course in the Street Mod class. That’s also why there’s a set of 18×10 Advan RZ’s with Hoosier A6s sitting in the garage.

There is a healthy amount of APR Performance products on the car. From the front splitter to the big GTC-300 wing.

Even the Vortex Generator is an APR piece! The short antennae is from Cusco, and calling it short is very generous.

There’s no massive diffuser, or uber rare bumper on the back of the car. It’s almost entirely factory save for the APR spoiler, a La Flama Blanca decal, and the tip of a Tomei Titanium cat-back exhaust. Ahead of that is a Tomei test pipe and Big Mouth down pipe. There’s also a Tomei upper intercooler pipe made of Titanium. Aside from the shiny pipe and the TurboSmart Dual Port blow off valve, there’s nothing screaming performance about the car. The AMS front lower motor mount and shifter bushings are hidden down under the motor, and the Exedy twin plate clutch is a piece that never sees the light of day. Even the interior is deceivingly pedestrian, save for the AEM UEGO, AccessPORT V3, Fat Perrin shift knob.

All of that go fast stuff you don’t see, or don’t notice because you’re used to seeing EVERY Evo X with parts like that, adds up. The numbers they add to are 293 horsepower to the wheels and 289 lb/ft of torque. That ain’t bad, but it’s also subject to change. If you owned a company that sells parts for a living, wouldn’t you want to throw a bigger intercooler or turbo or cams or whatever else suits your fancy at your shop car? Stick around.

Words and photos by Michael Chandler

*Article and Photos are copyright of CAMautoMag.Com and their respective owners.

Words and photos by Michael Chandler

Every year for… many years NASA Utah, and MPRA before them, have thrown an endurance race to close out the season. Normally it’s the standard X amount of hours in a row, on a track that has the corners in the same places as the lap before. This year things would be different. Very different. Not mind blowingly, life alteringly different, but still different. There would still be an endurance race, but not all in a row. It would run on the Outer Loop… and the East Course… and the West Course.

That’s right baby! Dynamic track! Basically here’s how it would shake out: All the HPDE groups and TT would run on the Outer Loop only, while the race group and the open wheel guys would jump between all three configurations. If you remember the Pirelli World Challenge races from a couple of months ago, then this track switching concept isn’t so foreign. They ran the World Challenge GT races on the Outer Loop, Spec B and Miller GT Challenge on the West Course and the NASCAR K&N Pro Series West guys got the East Course. What was foreign, and I can’t stress this enough, was having the same group of competitors running three different track configurations on the same day for the same race! Well, technically it wasn’t all the same race, but the drivers’ times in each race would be combined and whoever had the best time would be the class winner. Speaking of which, let’s stop talking about the track thing and talk about racing!

The Open Wheel guys were in the same boat as the Race Group: three different tracks, three races, one time to decide a winner. In Formula Troy Duffin and Steven Costello continued their season long battle, but at the end of the long day there had to be a winner. And that winner was Troy, who completed 34 laps in the allotted time compared to Steven’s 33. In Super Formula it was the the #11 Rodizio Grill sponsored car of Terry Biner running away with the class win, leaving Steve Burns and John LaBrie to duke it out for second. In what can only be described as driving feats never seen since the days of Juan Manuel Fangio*, Steve Burns defeated John LaBrie!

*Not really true at all, but both John and Steve had really good drives in their races

It was time for the TT competitors to take to the track after the Open Wheel drivers vacated it. Their four sessions held weight because, while the season points chases were over for everyone else, this was a points event for the TT drivers. While some people had wrapped up their season titles (more on that in another post), some people were still fighting tooth and nail for theirs. People like Shay Campbell and James Pasquier, who pitted their Porsche 911s against some ST3 competitors and a healthy chunk of the Spec Z field. Despite finishing in 14th, five spots behind James and scoring 5 points less than him, Shay locked up his TT3 points title! Meanwhile, at the front of the TT3 crowd, Travis Tidball took the win.

In TT1 the guys of TW Racing put their Audi R8 LMS atop the podium, and solidified their championship. However second place in the class was up for debate. If you remember, Shawn Murphy ventilated the engine block in his WRX STi which sidelined it for the remainder of the season and seemingly opened the door for Smith-Burke Racing to leapfrog one of our favorite Wyomingans… Wyomingites? Whatever, Shawn needed to hold off the C5 Corvette, so he did what any enterprising man with a willing girlfriend would do: he used her car for the last two events. He didn’t win, but he scored JUST enough points to hold off the Data Motorsports backed Corvette to stay in second place.

In TTE Ben Lamberson put used all 127 horsepower his Audi could muster to beat Steve Larsen, and cement his title. TTU was missing it’s most notable competitor: the Lyfe Motorsports/Wild Schick Racing R35 GTR was in California doing some testing, which left the class wide open for Rhett Panter to win. TT2 was won by David Bradshaw, and Josh Bennett took home the win in TTB.

And we finally arrive at the Race Group, the other group that would take on the perils of driving three different tracks over the course of one race day. It also had some interesting driver line-ups, including George Smith piloting a Miata with Les Long, Derek Wolthoff driving Brendon Stewart’s Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution, and… Well, there’s no easy way to say this…

PPPAAAAAAAUUUUUUUULLLLLLLLLLL MMMMIIIITTCCCCCCHHHHHHHEEEEEEEEEELLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Which was driven by Matt Guiver, Todd Ainsworth, Alex Whetman and Todd Green. That mighty team could only muster a third place finish in E3, behind Allan Anderson (who slid around Wind Up, but it’s cool because he has a Corolla so he knows what he’s doing) and David Sherman.

In E0 we saw No Whammies (Travis Tidball) hit big money and stop atop the podium, ahead of Travis Williams in the #22 Discount Tire FR500S Mustang and Good Guy Gus Stribakos in the 888 Porsche.

In a class by himself, literally, was the Idaho Mountain Touring Porsche 911 in E1. Let’s take a moment to appreciate how pretty it is. Ahhhhhhhh.

And now back to our regularly scheduled programming.

ES. The Big boys. You know the Names: TW Racing, Big Bob Evans, Dandy Dan Worley, Steve “Mister” Burns and “Mister En Fuego” Brendon Stweart. They were all fighting for the victory. The gritty field went wheel to wheel and door to door all day! Except when Brendon broke a suspension component. That sidelined him. And Bob blew a tire in the last race of the day, so his day ended early too… But when they were running, they were threatening to take away podium finishes from other drivers! In the end it came down to two teams: the TW Racing crew had adjusted their R8 LMS so Allen Turner could fully exploit it’s advantages, while Tatum Racing had the LSx powered Porsche 944 tuned to peak efficiency for Dan Worley. Who would emerge victorious?

In the end the Audi proved too much for the Porsche, and TW Racing took home the class and overall victory.

In the end, we all took home a victory. Over the course of the season we saw drivers snatch victory from the jaws of defeat and overcome devastating events. We saw camaraderie and good natured competitiveness, and most importantly: everyone at the end of the day could walk away uninjured.

And so ends the NASA season. On behalf of me and the staff here at CAMautoMag, I would like to say thank you to Matt Guiver, Dave Kizerian and Dan McKeever for the awesome season, the track workers for the thankless and tireless jobs they do to make the racing happen, and especially to the drivers. Everyone from the HPDE 1 drivers, all the way up to the Super Unlimited class drivers and everyone in between. We do this because we have the same passion as you guys, and since we can’t get out there and drive with you guys (yet!) the next best thing is to come out shoot some photos and say some nice words about what you’re doing out there.

We’ll be at the Awards Banquet on November 22, where we’re looking forward to seeing everyone! We will also have things for you to purchase if you so choose.

*Article and Photos are copyright of CAMAutoMag.Com and their respective owners.

Good news: there wasn’t a monsoon at Miller Motorsports Park over Memorial Day Weekend! Bad news: … Yeah. The good weather and holiday weekend brought out a healthy sized field. The TT class had twenty-one competitors in seven sub-classes, with TT3 fielding nine competitors!

And in TT3 we had a very close battle for the third spot on the podium! Chad Hess took his Porsche 911 to the final podium spot by a mere 1/1000 of a second over Shay Chappell’s Porsche 911. Finishing ahead of the tight battle was Josh Miller in second and Travis Tidball in first.

Scott Corsetti edged out Greg Valdez for the win, with Vincent McAllister rounding out the group.

TT1 saw the debut of a new chassis from T W Racing: Among the field of familiar cars was an Audi R8 LMS, which posted the fastest time of the TT field, and took home the TT1 win. Two seconds behind the Audi was the Corvette of Smith-Burke Racing, and two seconds behind them was the #667 Subaru of Shawn Murphy. Is this a sign of things to come? Will we soon see other IMSA GTD class cars competing in TT? I, for one, welcome our new IMSA overloards and may long should they reign.

Ahem

TTE was a two man race between Ben Lamberson’s Audi and Jeb Brown’s Subaru. Ben bested Jeb by two and a half seconds. TTC, TTB, and TTU were all one man affairs; with Richard Thiessens in TTB, Rod Kujaczynski in TTC, and Wild Schick Racing in TTU.

There were two open wheel races this weekend, and this time nobody spun like a top! The field even lined up, most likely unintentionally, for a very cool photo. And the racing was a good watch as well, specifically Chris Taylor going through the top of The Attitudes. He had no quarrel with getting right on top of the curbing! Unfortunately his placed in third for both Formula races. The finishing orders didn’t change at all for the classes in either race. Troy Duffin took first in Formula and Steven Costello took second. In Super Formula, Terry Biner beat out Ian Lacy both times; however, Ian posted a quicker fast lap than Terry in both races. Also of note: Ian ran a little over half the laps in each race.

The Lightning group had some close racing, but not necessarily for the Spec Z field. Arthur Golebiowski ran away from Tom Kaminski and Paul House. Arthur also ran away from the rest of the competitors in the run group, putting an eight second gap between himself and the next fastest driver. The next fastest driver was Blake Troester in GTS3, who took the class win over Gus Stribakos who retired from the race with four laps to go.

Spec Miata was a chess match, with Chris Bond looking to make a move on McKay Snow for most of the race. When an opportunity presented itself Chris took it, and put a 1.3 second gap between himself and the young Snow. David Sherman finished in third.

PTE was interesting. Allan Anderson and Todd Ainsworth finished second and third respectively, but Todd Green ran away with the win, and even got his nose in the Spec Miata pack. He was right up there with McKay and Chris.

While Spec Z and PTE had the largest margins of victory of the group, 944 Spec had the slimmest. Samuel Kapp and Otto Silva might as well have had their bumpers tied together the whole race. Samuel beat out Otto by 0.137 seconds. Placing third, a respectable 1.491 seconds behind Mr. Kapp was Greg Troester.

American Iron and PTB only had one competitor each, which is somewhat sad. Bill Noblitt and his PTB Boxster need a playmate, and Mike Mieke’s Firebird looks so lonely out there. Someone grab a Fox Body and get out there with Mike, and someone else get cracking on another PTB entry!

After the Lightning came the Thunder, which saw John Potter (Detroit) take the Magnus Racing Porsche out against David Donner in GTSU. David was a good sport as John hung a 28.277 second gap on him.

GTS5 had Alan Wilson, the guy who designed the track at Miller Motorsports Park, defeating Michael Stevenson while also showcasing a new track design on the hood of his yellow Porsche.

Darrell Troester (the third Troester for those keeping score at home) was competing against people in other classes, because he was the lone competitor in GTS4.

The three car field of ST1 featured three cars powered by big, american V8s. Unfortunately for Bob Evans and Dan Worley one of those cars was the Smith-Burke Corvette, which walked away from them at a brisk pace. Bob put the #88 Snickers/EA Sports Ford Fusion in second and Dan retired five laps in.

Bad Luck Brendon had some bad luck in ST2, but not catastrophically bad! It was more of a puzzling bad. On lap 11 his Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution just stopped running. No fires, no wheels flying off, no hitting of tire barriers and armco. It just stopped. After it was towed to the paddock, and after the race, the car started up and ran again. Initial speculation was that something over heated, and the leisurely tow off the track allowed it to cool off enough to start working again. Either way, he took home the class win because he was the only one in the class.

Super Touring 3, aka the Mustaing And Occasional Others class, was deep as usual. In a class dominated by Ford products, a pair of Corvettes managed to take two fo the top three spots. Cary Wilson put his black and green Corvette atop the podium, while Travis Tidball parked his blue Corvette in third. Alex Whetman, through sheer grit, cunning and over boosting, put the Focus of Doom in second.

Super Unlimited was interesting not only because Dave Dingman’s Miata was in the class, and not because of Bob Blizzard’s Ford Ranger looking thing. The class was won by James Miller in the chop top C4 Corvette, with George Smith in second and Bob Blizzard sliding his way into third. Wild Shick Racing, which posted the fastest single lap time of the group, finished last after contact with the Smith-Burke Racing Corvette left Kyle with a down right rear tire. I’ve heard the story from Kyle, and I’d like to hear the Smith-Burke side.

It was another good weekend for race fans and organizers. Hopefully the June event will be an even better one. If you’d like to come out and race, then go ahead and register! If you just want to come out and watch some racing and meet some drivers, then that’s a great option as well. Either way, we look forward to another race weekend and seeing you guys out there!